


Deadly Sins

by Daegaer



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angels, Cars, Demons, Gen, Sins
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2003-03-18
Updated: 2003-03-18
Packaged: 2017-10-17 18:28:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/179898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daegaer/pseuds/Daegaer





	Deadly Sins

_Gluttony_

Aziraphale loved this time of year. The need for finding a new supplier, one he had never seen before, would never see again. The need to give Crowley the run-around in a convincing manner. The way he felt – knowing this was a very, very bad idea but being unable to resist. The anticipation beforehand, the self-disgust afterwards along with promises he’d never, ever do this again. Sheer paranoia drove him out of London some years, afraid he’d meet someone who might remember him, however vaguely. A decade previously Crowley had become enormously suspicious, and had shadowed him everywhere for months. Aziraphale had bitten his fingernails to the quick during that time, and his manicurist had spoken to him very sharply indeed. He’d avoided a repeat performance the next year by taking the ferry to Dublin. Crowley hadn’t been able to go to Ireland since the embarrassing incident in the fifth century that neither of them referred to. After exhausting suppliers in Dublin, he hadn’t seen any particular reason why he shouldn’t go to Cork, and goodness, Galway was _lovely_ at this time of year and why shouldn’t he spend a few days off by himself? After which he’d gone to check on things in Northern Ireland and had only gone home after he’d disgraced himself over the entire island. Currently, he was hiding beside a magazine display in a small newsagent on the Isle of Skye. He was rather proud of his disguise: well tailored black suit, black shirt, black tie, fancy black snakeskin shoes, and a pair of sunglasses Crowley had been missing for _weeks_ , the poor thing. The moment was almost right. The only other customer paid for her bread and milk and left, and the shopkeeper shot him a rather sceptical look. Aziraphale took a deep breath, felt the reassuring roll of banknotes in his pocket, and slithered up to the counter in a creditable imitation of Crowley’s walk.

“I’ll take your entire stock of Cream Eggs,” he said breathlessly.

 

****

Crowley staggered up the stairs, waved his door open and crashed inside. He barely made it to the sofa, and collapsed full length. What had he been thinking? He wished he could die, but felt he might settle for a fortnight of completely undisturbed sleep until he felt better. Just before he passed out he made himself a promise: the next time he felt the urge to eat an entire sheep, he was damn well going to stay in snake form until it was digested.

 

 _Envy_

When Aziraphale walks down the street, people tend not to notice him. Even when he’s sure he’s perfectly visible people bump into him, and he’s the one who somehow ends up apologising. When he’s invisible it’s worse, especially during rush hour. When _Crowley_ walks down the street, people get out of his way. Usually they don’t realise they’re doing it, it’s just that Crowley cannot conceive of a world where someone might actually occupy the piece of pavement he wants to stand on. Aziraphale watches him in action, quick strides along the most crowded streets in London, never so much as brushed against by the mortal inhabitants. If he walks fast in his wake, Aziraphale can feel something of the pleasure of getting where you want to go without someone standing on your shoes. Crowley doesn’t swagger, doesn’t need to when every step he takes proclaims with perfect self-confidence that maybe people should get out of the way of Hell’s field agent. It’s wrong to want so badly to be able to do that, but after six thousand years Aziraphale is getting tired of the continual jostling.

* * * * *

 _Lust_

Crowley looked out his bedroom window at the bright sunshine and grinned evilly. A decent day for it at last. He hated doing it in the rain, and there hadn’t been a properly sunny day for weeks. Not that he’d forget the way to reach his goal, of course. It was like riding a bicycle; once learned never forgotten. Although he’d never admit being able to ride a bicycle of course. That was a more – angelic – sort of transport. An image of Aziraphale falling off a bike flashed into his mind, cheering him immensely. He shoved the laughter down, concentrated on the longed-for reunion. He imagined stroking the smooth skin, feeling the shiver beneath his hands. He closed his eyes, and felt himself shiver at the mere thought. His breath quickened as he remembered the response he could get if he pushed for just a little more than would be thought possible. He swallowed hard, enjoying the feel of a suddenly dry mouth, and wiped damp hands on his thighs. He wondered if he might burst with anticipation, and forced himself to walk slowly to the door, even slower down the stairs. He paused for just a moment at the street door, one hand resting lightly on the wood as if he could feel the desired presence outside. All right. Enough was enough. There was a point at which anticipation became torture, and he only enjoyed torture when the person in agony wasn’t him. He flung the door open and rushed outside.

“Hey, baby,” he whispered, running a gentle hand over the Bentley’s bonnet. “Miss me? We’re going for a long spin today; all the way to Inverness on the scenic route, promise.”

* * * * *

 _Avarice_

Aziraphale meandered up Charing Cross Road, humming “O Jerusalem” quietly to himself. It always took hours, because he went into each and every bookshop. There are a _lot_ of bookshops in Charing Cross Road, but he wasn’t in any hurry. He’d started out quite early in the morning with a handful of empty carrier bags, and it was now 2pm and his arms were getting tired with the weight of his purchases. He was also getting decidedly peckish. A cup of tea and a few sticky buns would not go astray. When he’d finished with this second hand shop he’d go straight to the nearest café, he thought. There wasn’t anything worth buying here anyway. A cheap paperback that promised an exciting history of violent crime caught his eye. On a whim he picked it up. It looked _very_ lurid. Perfect for a spur of the moment gift for Crowley. He idly peered into the space where it had been and froze. There was something old in there. He pulled out an old, old book, opened it, looked at the print, looked at the title page. Looked at the title page again. Oh, oh dear heavens. A first edition _Vanity Fair_. With a horrid bright yellow price sticker on its poor, dear front cover. _£5.50?_ That couldn’t be right, surely? The thought struck like one of Crowley’s “harmless” cocktails. _They didn’t know what this was. He could walk out of here with this for less than he’d be willing to pay for a snack_. Aziraphale swayed a little, and saw black spots in front of his eyes. He could practically see a little Crowley sitting on his left shoulder telling him to buy it, and a little version of himself on the right shoulder gently admonishing him to do the proper thing. He smothered a hysterical giggle, and checked his wallet. Oh dear. He was down to his last £10. He’d ask them to hold on to the book, and would come back later. Yes, he’d tell them what it was and pay a proper price. He wandered up to the desk, his prize and the crime book in his hand. As he reached it, the assistant looked up and gave him an insincere smile.

As clear as if she had shouted it, he heard her think “Jesus. Doesn’t this guy have any life? Third time this bloody week I have to hear him call me ‘dearest lady’.”

He blinked. _Well_. A person tried to be _polite_. He gave her a sweet and sunny smile, and put both books in front of her.

“Good afternoon, my dear,” he said cheerfully. “Lovely weather, isn’t it?”

“Mmm,” she said, throwing the books into a paper bag. “£8.50.”

“Thank you, _dearest lady_ ,” he said, accepting his change and watching her try not to roll her eyes.

He casually put the books into the least crammed of his bags and sauntered out, struggling not to grin. He would _not_ think about the warm, naughty glow he was feeling. He had got a good bargain, that was all. And he even still had enough for a nice cup of tea.

 

* * * * *

 _Sloth_

After using the chamber pot, and washing his hands in the dusty water from the pitcher, Crowley sleepily peered around his room. A bit grimy looking. Maybe he should fix that. He thought about getting dressed, and maybe going out for a bite to eat. He quite fancied something stodgy and sweet. With a few glasses of wine to wash it down. He yawned. Who knew what the angel was up to without someone to keep an eye on him? Probably off inspiring all sorts of tedious good works. Hah. It’d be safe to leave him alone for a while. What could he do after all? Abolish slavery? And if he went out for food he’d have to work out what people were wearing, get dressed appropriately and wait for his meal to be cooked. It all sounded too much like work, and his bed looked so warm, and comfortable and enticing. Crowley snuggled himself back under the blankets, telling himself sternly not to sleep a moment past 1885. Moments later he was dead to the world again, a contented little smile on his lips.

 

* * * * *

 

 _Anger_

 

Crowley gunned the Bentley’s engine, shot down the crowded street. Pedestrians flung themselves backwards onto the pavement, or, if he saw them in time, simply decided they weren’t going to cross the road in the first place. Traffic lights turned green in self-defence as he approached. Other drivers suffered the fright of their lives, and everyone felt sure they hadn’t seen a very old, very nice car going three times the residential area speed limit. Crowley’s mouth was set in a straight, tight line, and there was a pronounced hellish glow in his eyes. He was not in a good mood. Now, demons are supposed to be petty and vengeful, and anger is a more or less permanent state of being for most of them. Crowley frequently felt angry, especially when he thought about his superiors, his job description and the way that apparently any idiot could get a driving license these days. His superiors treated him like a rag to be used to wipe up messes in the world; just a thing to be used and not treated with respect and generally hung out to dry afterwards. His job description was vague and undefined, and anything bad that happened to him in the course of his work magically appeared in his contracts as an exception he couldn’t claim for. He wasn’t even going to get into the way he felt the time that Micra had tried to cut the Bentley off. The point is, though, that what with hating his superiors and a lot of the work they shoved onto him, and the all-encompassing contempt he felt for every other driver on the road, Crowley had very handy safety valves for the release of rage.

Aziraphale did not. He didn’t hate his superiors, although if he were drunk enough he could be persuaded into wickedly accurate impersonations of various Seraphim. He didn’t hate his job as far as Crowley could see. And he didn’t drive so he had never experienced the burning rage that envelops the hearts of drivers of big cars when they see a flock of brightly coloured small ones. Since Aziraphale and he had stopped fighting the angel simply didn’t get angry. In fact Aziraphale now seemed to think anger was something angels should stay well away from, and angels that disagreed and chucked lightning bolts around had always embarrassed him. This didn’t mean he didn’t get snippy, or couldn’t be sarcastic and irritated when he wanted, but the big stuff, the stuff that would have had Crowley screaming and growling and terrifying other drivers – _that stuff_ Aziraphale repressed like he was living in turn of the century Vienna. Crowley didn’t feel that was very healthy, hell, even humans agreed about that. The trouble was, as Crowley had tried delicately to point out, if a human repressed and repressed and repressed and then snapped and went out to make their exciting new views on gun control known, what could they really do, in the greater scheme of things? Regrettable, but not much more than a blip on the divine/demonic radar. People who happened to be immortal and therefore capable of repressing for centuries, and who had much more than human weaponry in their personal arsenals, now that was a problem, wasn’t it? Aziraphale of course, had looked innocent and said he really didn’t know what Crowley was talking about.

Which was why Crowley was currently engaged in an extended bout of attempted vehicular homicide. He was sure that no one in the entire Greater London Area with the slightest openness to the supernatural hadn’t felt the metaphysical explosion. The only questions in Crowley’s mind were _What has he done this time?_ and _How are we going to cover it up?_ Previous occurrences had been dealt with by Crowley filing the paperwork and taking the credit. So far, fire from Heaven had never been called in - which was good, because Crowley didn’t see how he’d be able to claim that as his doing. Seeing as London still seemed to exist, he felt that at least he wouldn’t have _that_ bureaucratic nightmare to deal with. Something smaller, then. Good. Probably something nasty involving mistreated children - that had set off the last two times after all. Crowley spun the wheel round, forced the Bentley up a laneway that had not previously been wide enough for a car, and screeched to a halt. He sighed as he saw the calm puzzled expression on Aziraphale’s face, as if he couldn’t quite fathom why Crowley should be here. Selective bloody amnesia seemed to have already set in. Crowley hopped out and surveyed the damage. As far as he could see there was only one body, but it wasn’t too easy to tell. Not to worry; one human more or less was easy to lose in the paperwork. He’d try and ferret out the reason for this later. Right now he’d be happy to get away from here. He waved his hand, and every scrap of evidence burned down to the finest ash. Another gesture, and Aziraphale was no longer a hazard to the car’s interior. Then he shoved Aziraphale into the passenger seat, and got them out of the area, fast as he could. They really had to come up with a better way of dealing with this sort of thing.

 

* * *

 _Pride_

 

Newt laid out the entire set of cables in a neat little row. The manual was at the correct page, held carefully open with non-breakable, non-spillable paperweights. Every single thing in the room that could possibly fall over or distract him had been carefully removed to the hallway. He very carefully opened the box and slid out the contents. The Styrofoam packing went on the other side of the room, where it couldn’t possibly do anything. The TV was already turned off, turned round, and waiting. He put the VCR on the shelf beneath the TV. Referring frequently to the manual, he connected up the cables. Everything looked fine, just like in the diagram. He turned the TV stand around again, and gingerly plugged everything in. He turned the TV on, and was rewarded with a nice clear reception of BBC1. And BBC2, and ITV, and Channel 4. Like just about everyone else, they didn’t get Channel 5 here. Well, that all still worked. He pointed the remote at the VCR and turned it on too. Everything continued to work. He had done it. He had successfully connected up electrical equipment and it still worked. He _knew_ none of the accidents had ever been his fault. He couldn’t help the shoddy wiring some councils had around the place. The cheek of those officials, complaining to his poor mother. More public spending, that was what was needed, not harassing kids who liked to take things apart and put them back together again. Wait till Anathema got home and saw all this. It’d be a great surprise for her. The VCR’s display was telling him it didn’t have a cassette. That was the second part of the surprise. She’d been upset to miss _Coronation Street_ , so he’d got Mrs Young to tape the whole week’s lot of episodes. He’d have it on for when she came in. He fully expected to have an impressed, delighted and grateful girlfriend. He’d better check that Mrs Young had actually recorded it. He’d been told that some people found it hard to operate VCRs. He put the tape in, turned the TV channel to 0, just like the manual said.

Newt pressed “Play”.

All over Lower Tadfield, the lights went out.


End file.
